Cops carrying out a purge on stolen mobile phone sellers have swooped on Nine Elms Market and carrried out nine arrests.

Officers raided the market near Vauxhall on Saturday morning after receiving information stalls were selling stolen handsets.

Working with immigration officers and Trading Standards officers, police targeted eight stalls and made nine arrests; eight for handling stolen phones and the ninth was arrested by immigration officers after he was found to have been deported twice from the UK in the last 10 years.

Police recovered 48 phones that were either reported as stolen from locations all across London, or had been blocked by the mobile service provider, which is an indicator that they may also be stolen.

In addition two separate amounts of £1,000 cash was seized from two of those arrested.

The eight suspected handlers were questioned and bailed ot return to police at a later date.